Masks
by Mango Marbles
Summary: Everyone wears masks. The Winchesters just wear a few more than others. One-shot collection.
1. Dean: Late Teens

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

Dean's the tough guy. The guy in the leather jacket with a silver tongue that can charm any woman, and 'playing hard to get' is a phrase he doesn't know. With a wink and an award-winning smile, the bartender gives him a drink without any questions or any need for him to show her his fake ID.

There's swagger in his step and a fun-loving, lighthearted tone in his voice with just the right edge of a challenge lining his words when he walks up to the pool table and asks if anyone's up for a quick match. He tells them he's played before, but doesn't get the opportunity to play as often as he would like. He's a drifter, not the kind of person to stay in one place for long enough to become a regular.

They take him up on the offer, and ask him where he's been and where he's going, but both answers are too vague to decipher. Then, when they ask how Dean feels about making the game a little more interesting, he's all for it. He likes to gamble a bit, and he tells them he's feeling lucky tonight.

His opponent has an over-eager buddy. The kind that can't stop talking about half a dozen topics simultaneously, and each topic is discussed with the same amount of enthusiasm. He gets a round of drinks for all the guys standing around the table, and Dean counts himself lucky. A few victims to hustle and some free beer. There aren't many things that could make his night better. When Dad tells him to replenish their funds while he goes on a hunt, he can't say that he doesn't enjoy that order.

He also can't say that he fully wipes away the dejected face Sam wore when he walked out of the door without him, leaving him alone again because he's not allowed to go out and he has nowhere to go anyway.

It's for Sam that he does this, he tells himself. He's doing this so Sam can eat something nice. Or so Sam can get a new backpack to replace the tattered bag he uses as one. Or so Sam can get some new clothes since he's growing out of his current ones so quickly.

They might be excuses, but that doesn't mean there's no truth to them. That's all Dean needs to enjoy his break at the bar. He gets to enjoy being a little normal in a fun way. He almost feels like a frat boy from the movies he sees and the parties he crashes when they happen to stay in a college town.

He wins the pool game with ease, and by then the alcoholics he played against are drunk enough to believe his lie that it was due to beginner's luck.

A woman in a short dress with a low neckline slinks up to him. Her words are clear enough that she isn't too drunk, but Dean's pretty drunk himself at that point, not that alcohol has ever dissuaded him from doing as he pleases. Her cherry red lips outline her sweet words, and the rasp in her voice seals the deal.

She tastes of fruity drinks, the kind that Dean would never order for himself. Secondhand drinking them, well, he can handle that.

She tells him her roommate is on a business trip and her apartment can be theirs for the night, and he asks what kind of gentleman he would be if he doesn't give a pretty lady a ride home.

She spends the car ride as close to being in his lap as possible, and he's as drunk on her perfume as he is on whiskey and beer. How he manages to get them to her place in one piece is a miracle that he doesn't understand, but he's not about to question it.

* * *

He goes back to the motel early in the morning, before the Sun's had the chance to rise yet. The woman he was with was still asleep when he left. She seems like the type that expects her one night stand to be next to her in the morning, but Dean doesn't know her name and he has other responsibilities. Responsibilities that are more important to him than the chance to enjoy the comfort of a real bed with a woman and silky sheets in a place that doesn't smell like human waste.

He shuts the door silently and takes his shoes off as quietly as he can. He's sober enough to be considerate over how much noise he makes and to know that he'll have a hell of a hangover in the morning.

But he doesn't get himself ready for bed right away. He stops at Sam's bed and listens to his deep, steady breathing. He doesn't have swagger in his steps anymore. He doesn't have the untouchable aura, and he left his leather jacket on the back of a chair near the door. His award-winning smile is gone and replaced by something softer. Something sadder.

Sam looks peaceful, and that's more than Dean can ask for. Ever since the night Sam read their dad's journal and had the real world they live in revealed, he has frequent, violent nightmares. Even now, years later, the nightmares have a hold on him. Only they're worse since Sam's had firsthand experience with hunting.

Dean hopes that Sam remains this peaceful throughout the night, but he knows there's a fifty-fifty chance, at best, that it'll happen. It takes only seconds for his peace to dissolve into pain and horror, and the most Dean can do at that point is wake Sam up and offer to stay up with him if going back to sleep is no longer an option.

There's a group of men who saw him as a friend while he played pool and drank with them for a few hours. There's a bartender who never asked him his real age and served him anyway. There's a woman lying in her own bed who thought, for the night, that she was Dean's entire world.

But they were all wrong. The man that each of them knew is not the man that Dean really is. Right here, right now with Sam is the real Dean. He's not the tough guy or the lady killer. He's not winning pool games on the lie of beginner's luck or drinking enough to rival John, whom some might consider a functioning alcoholic.

He's the older brother. He's the mother and father. He's the guardian and the best friend.

He might fill many roles in his life, but there's only one role that he puts his heart and soul into. It's the real him who brushes Sam's long hair away from his closed eyes.

He sighs and gets himself ready to pass out on his own bed. He's at the right level of buzzed and the right level of consciousness that all the thoughts he keeps at the back of his mind flow into the front. Like the thought that Sam's growing up, and one day won't need Dean to fill all the roles he's taken upon himself. He won't want Dean's hovering or coddling, and he's starting to only tolerate it already.

One day, the person Dean really is won't be needed, and he's not sure that he'll be able to hide that pain behind the masks he's made for himself.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** This is another tentatively complete story. I might add chapters for Sam and John, and maybe Mary, but I'm not sure.

Please leave a review and tell me what you thought!


	2. Sam: Stanford

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

Jess smiles at Sam with a warmth untouched by the chill of the darkness that Sam lived in for eighteen years. Sam mirrors it, but he's afraid that she'll see through the illusion he's creating and notice the lack of genuine happiness in his expressions.

It's hard to be at ease when he sees shadows moving in every corner. It's hard to sleep next to her knowing about the things that lurk in the dark, and knowing that he's not doing anything to protect her or himself besides keeping a canister of salt under the bed with a gun that Dean must have slipped into his bag before he left. He feels exposed, but Jess would think he's crazy if he tries doing anything more to ward off evil that she wouldn't believe exists.

They go to sleep, but Sam doesn't drift off until long after Jess has fallen asleep. His eyes open at the slightest sounds, even if they end up being the result of the wind, rain tapping against the windows, or something else as normal and insignificant. He can't shake the feeling of being watched.

Somehow, he manages to fall asleep most nights, trying to ignore the thoughts of living nightmares occupying his mind.

Jess wakes before him every morning, or so she believes. The truth is that Sam is awake the minute she starts shifting. It's the training that his body won't let him forget, the ability to be ready at a moment's notice in case of an emergency. In case of an inhuman attack.

But he keeps his eyes closed and his breathing even, fooling her into believing that he's still deep in sleep. It's a technique that he mastered through the years of his childhood to fool Dean after he had nightmares and after he reached the age where it was no longer normal to seek comfort from his big brother when he woke up in the middle of the night.

He suspects that Dean saw through it every time, but never said anything.

His reasons for the charade are different now. Once Jess stretches and yawns and rubs her eyes until she's a little more detached from the dreams trying to keep her tethered to unconsciousness, she kisses Sam awake. It's sweet and gentle and so unlike the way that he's used to being woken up that he doesn't mind that he'll have to face another new day afterwards.

Mornings are slow and quiet. No yelling or commands. Jess lists off her plans for the day, having anticipated the weekend's arrival after a grueling week of midterm exams, and Sam listens and nods. She paints her lips with a glossy red lipstick because she knows that Sam likes the color on her.

She takes her time getting ready for the day, but Sam is ready to go in less than fifteen minutes.

Growing up, time was a luxury that he never seemed to have.

While they're out, Sam is the perfect boyfriend. He listens to Jess without complaining about the topic. He carries her bags when she decides to stop in a shop to buy things she doesn't need.

He can't give her money that he doesn't have or fancy dinners at five-star restaurants, and buying her an engagement ring seems like a faraway dream. But he gives her all his love and hopes it's enough while they eat leftover pizza together on the couch of their apartment and watch soap operas for the sake of making fun of the characters and the over-the-top situations they're put in.

Jess' laughter is rich and full, uninhibited. Sam's laughter is hollow. He's been in situations that no one would believe. No one except other hunters.

Jess puts her hand on his arm and asks him what's wrong, but he shakes his head and says nothing. He plasters a new smile onto his face and says that he was just thinking about one of his tests. He wonders if he did well on it, he tells her.

She laughs and says that he probably studied more than the rest of the students in his class combined. That he has nothing to worry about.

He laughs along, but Jess doesn't understand that he has too many things to worry about. Things that she'll never have to know exist, if he has any say in it.

* * *

On campus, he's just another student with a backpack slung over his shoulder and a leisurely pace set for walking from one building to the next for his classes. Other students think he's a teacher's pet, but he's knows the value of working for an education. It was what landed him a free ride at one of the most prestigious colleges in the first place.

He brushes their comments off, but he feels as much like a stranger as he has everywhere else. He's used to being the outsider, and he isn't bullied like he used to be when he was a scrawny kid who barely reached Dean's chest in height.

This is the life he chose to give up his family for, but there's a loneliness to it. He wonders on more than one occasion what the point is. Why bother going to school when he knows what's in the dark? Is it to spite his father, who never gave him the chance to choose his own path?

He finds his classroom and sits in the middle of the small group of friends he has in it. He laughs at their jokes and contributes to the conversation just enough that they don't ask him questions. He doesn't feel like talking, but he doesn't want any of them to pry into his problems. It's easier to let them assume that his family isn't in the picture, and maybe they've already made up their own theories that he doesn't have family.

He prefers to let them think whatever they want when it comes to his family and his past because he can't explain the fallout to them. He can't explain where he's been or why.

Despite being in the middle of his friends, Sam feels like more of an outsider than ever.

* * *

When he grapples with an intruder in the middle of the night, visions of Jess pinned to the ceiling and dripping blood onto him are all he sees when he closes his eyes. He's had the same nightmare for over a week now, and the intruder interrupting his sleep, to pull him away from the repeating nightmare, is a small blessing.

Sam finds himself pinned and readies to flip both of them so that he's the one pinning the man who broke into his apartment. But he hears a voice so familiar that it hurts.

"Easy, tiger."

It's Dean. Dean who broke in and fought with him before pinning him.

For a moment in the darkness, a relieved smile breaks out on Sam's face. Seeing Dean again brings back a happiness and warmth that he's almost forgotten.

His smile is short-lived and there are too many emotions warring within him to bring it back. His two worlds are colliding and he feels the impact.

Yet, when Dean asks for help searching for the father who practically threw him out, Sam agrees rather easily with only the condition that he's back by Monday. Dean shrugs at it, and Sam knows that he'll try talking Sam into quitting school. That he'll try talking Sam into giving it all up and rejoining the hunt.

And Sam won't deny that they easily fall back into their old patterns, communicating without saying a word. He doesn't miss Stanford all that much while he's with Dean, though Jess crosses his mind more than a few times, especially in the night, when he wakes up from the same dream of her death.

When Dean asks him what's bothering him and why he's getting up in the middle of the night, Sam says he doesn't want to talk about it. Dean accepts his answer, but Sam doesn't have to twist his mouth into any fake smiles or force the fear and sadness deep within himself so that no one else will see it.

With Dean, he never has to pretend to be someone he's not.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Thank you for the reviews, follows, and favorites! I hope that you enjoy Sam's chapter as much as you enjoyed Dean's. Once again, this story will remain tentatively complete.


	3. John

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

He's heard it countless times from countless hunters, that he shouldn't be dragging children across the country with him on his quest for vengeance. He _knows_ that already. He knew that the second he left Lawrence in the rear view mirror with all the belongings they took with them packed in the trunk of the Impala. He's a terrible father, and Sam and Dean deserve better, but he doesn't remember how to _be_ better.

His own father walked out on him and his mother, disappearing one day and never coming back. He feels like he's done the same to his boys. After Mary died, he's never been the same person. Sure, he's around physically, but the man he used to be burned alongside Mary. Some days, he barely feels human. Maybe he's just a machine now. An emotionless soldier who has a mission, and nothing else matters except that mission.

He comes home at all hours of the night, whether he's been out on a hunt or just at the nearest bar. Dean is awake to greet him almost every time with the stoic face that he saw too many of when he was a Marine. The soldier mask. Dean tells him that he's fine, and Sam's fine. He tells him if Sam ate his dinner, or if he insisted that he wasn't hungry and pushed his food around until Dean gave up trying to get it in his stomach.

He looks down into Dean's expectant eyes and knows that he's the one responsible for the dulled look in them. He's the one responsible for the downward curve of Dean's lips and the shadows under his eyes.

The worst part is that he doesn't know how to change it anymore. He gives Dean a curt nod and a pat on the shoulder before sending him to bed. He settles himself in bed preparing for a hangover in the morning. He wonders if Dean remembers what it was like to be a carefree child, but he can't give that childhood back to him. He wonders if it's worse that Sam never got to experience it at all. He'll never know what he's missing out on, but he'll understand one day that they're more different from other families than he knows.

And it's so much easier to shift his responsibilities to Dean and not think about them. To not have to deal with the endless questions that Sam asks that he doesn't want to answer.

* * *

Sam scares him. Not in that he's afraid of Sam, but he fears _for_ Sam. He sees a darkness in him that he never saw in Dean. There's rebellion and fire. There's anger, and it's usually directed at him these days.

Maybe if he had stayed in Lawrence and raised his boys properly, it wouldn't be there. Maybe Sam having the normalcy he craved would've curbed the darkness growing within him.

But Sam was seventeen now, almost eighteen, and not a day passes by where they don't fight. Not a day passes by where Dean doesn't have to play peacemaker because him and Sam don't know how to see eye-to-eye anymore. He's not sure that they ever knew how in the first place.

Tonight is worse. Sam slaps a piece of paper down on the table, pride for once more prominent than rage, and John sees Mary in his enthusiasm. "I'm going to Stanford. I'm going to get a degree and make a life outside of hunting," Sam says.

John looks at the words on the paper, an acceptance from one of the most prestigious colleges. He's proud, too. And he's sad that Mary never got to see the young men that her boys have grown into.

But he hides all other emotions behind the stoic soldier mask that he's seen Dean pick up and wear since he was a child.

"You're not going," he says. His tone leaves no room for argument, his statement is more of a command.

The pride fades from Sam's face, replaced by twisted hatred. "You can't stop me," Sam says. Seeing the fire in him, John internally agrees. He can't stop Sam from doing what he wants to, the kid's too stubborn and strong. He wishes that he could send Sam off with a bear hug and a smile, but he reigns in the fatherly part of him that's trying to sneak through the cracks of his cold exterior.

"You walk out that door, you don't come back," John says. He can't stop Sam, but he can threaten him. All or nothing. He hates himself for resorting to such a low blow, to the implication that Sam can only have a family or an education, not both.

The problem is he doesn't know what else to do. He can't let Sam walk out the door and be at the mercy of every supernatural creature waiting for the chance to sink their teeth into him. He can't tell Sam that the demon who killed Mary was there for him, that he has a dark destiny slated for him and John fears the only way to save him might be to kill him.

Sam chooses education. He grabs his bag along with his acceptance letter, and he leaves, slamming the door shut.

John turns and sees Dean standing in the doorway, too stunned to move. Pale enough that John thinks he might pass out, and he knows that it's his fault. If he remembered how to communicate with his children and be a father, maybe he could've prevented all the pain he's caused them.

But he doesn't remember how to do something as simple as comfort them, so he walks past Dean without a word or a hint as to what he's feeling. He shuts himself away in his bedroom.

Mary would be so disappointed in him, but that would never compare to how disappointed he is in himself.

* * *

He stares down the demon who stole away his wife and the life he once had. He always thought this moment would end with the demon's death, not his. But now he's offering The Colt and his soul to the demon who sent him spiraling into the darkness of the supernatural world for the sake of his son.

He won't be able to watch out for Sammy, or try to thwart the plans the demons have for him, but for once, he feels like he's doing what he needs to for his sons. For once, he's putting them before himself, the way a father should. He has no delusions that Dean won't be able to kill Sam if it comes to it, no matter if John asks him to or not.

But he weaves through the halls of the hospital to Dean's room and sees him sitting up, awake and alive. That sight reminds him that it's worth it. He leans in and gives Dean the final order that he knows he won't follow. Dean would die before he ever let Sam die, but John hopes that he would realize the point where killing Sam would be a mercy compared to the destiny that looms over him.

Dean looks at him with his mouth hanging open, not able to form any words. John doesn't mind. He flashes one last sad smile at Dean before he leaves the room and returns to the one he was admitted to. He won't see his sons again, and it hurts that his last words to Sam were asking him for some coffee just for the sake of having a moment alone with Dean. It hurts that his last words to Dean were asking him to kill Sam, if necessary.

He accepts his death, for once not hiding behind lies. He doesn't need to. He's not afraid. He's a little worried, but more for his boys than for himself. While he knows that he's been far from the perfect father, and he's not sure how his boys will deal with Yellow Eyes and anything that lies after him, he knows he's doing one thing right for once.

He doesn't feel the pain, hellhounds saved for a different damned soul, but time stops for just a second before darkness envelopes him and he has one final thought.

Mary, he thinks, would be proud of him this time.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** This story is, as always, tentatively complete.

Thank you to everyone who reads, reviews, follows, and favorites!


	4. Mary: Post-Resurrection

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

She should be ashamed. She should hate herself, but she prefers the company of the British Men of Letters to the company of her own sons.

She remembers how much she gave up to have a normal life without hunting for ten years. She played the role of housewife for John, and their relationship might not have been perfect, but they made it through the tough times. Hers had been a house full of love and endless potential for her boys to grow up ignorant of the nightmares she knew about. The nightmares she tried to forget.

All that she worked for burned alongside her in that little suburban house that she fell in love with the second she went to the open house with John.

She remembers and misses all those things, and she remembers what it means to be a mother. The problem is that her children are strangers now, expecting things of her that she's not ready to give.

The British Men of Letters don't expect her to be anything she's not. They recognize the killer hidden within her, and that's the skill set they want. They don't want her love or to bond with her. They just want the job done.

Being with Ketch is easy. Neither of them hold onto delusions that their fling is anything more than that. It's not awkward, and she feels a stab of guilt at the knowledge that she's more comfortable having sex with a man she barely knows than when she's simply in the same room as her children. Her flesh and blood.

The boy she was supposed to raise right, but she died before she had the chance.

"Don't get any ideas about this," she tells Ketch while she redresses.

He brushes off her words like he can't believe she's suggesting he would think about their affair as anything more than that. He's not a family man, he tells her.

She wants to believe that she's a family woman, but she's in a motel room with a man who's been labeled by other Men of Letters as a sociopath instead of with her children.

She glances in the mirror, hating the woman who stares back at her.

* * *

She's not sure how it happens, but her memories turn into blurs of hunts in which she kills monsters without remorse or hesitation. She's become a machine against her will, but she feels like she might have always been this person deep inside and that the Men of Letters simply dragged it out of her.

The eyes she looks out of are not her own, and she's a prisoner in her own body. She remembers a room with monitors that had names and pictures on them. She remembers seeing Sam and Dean on those screens, marked for death by the British Men of Letters.

She knows she should do something about that, but her limbs don't obey her and her mind feels number with each minute that passes.

The creatures she hunts turn from monsters to humans. She becomes the hunter of hunters, and she feels nothing for killing any of them. Someone's voice echoes in the back of her head. It tells her that they had to go, and she's just the tool that's weeding them out. She's an extension of something bigger. Of something good.

* * *

It's not long before the flashes of memories turn into the stable memory of raising Sam and Dean, back when they were the ages she thinks they should be. She knows it's a lie, but it's better than witnessing her actions in the real world.

She plasters a smile on and raises her children the way she always wanted to. Safe and normal.

Dean watches her. The real Dean. Adult Dean. He's trying to reach her through the memory she's decided to live in, begging her to notice him. Begging her to come back, _please_.

It doesn't take him long to realize that she's there by choice. That she's given up on controlling her own body, and it's easier to pretend she's somewhere she's not. The transition from pleading to angry is even quicker than his realization.

His tone turned hateful and full of accusations. He can't believe that she's so willing to abandon her family, and part of her can't believe it either.

But here she is, hiding in her own mind like a coward. Taking the easy way out.

Each word of Dean's list about the effects of her deal with the yellow eyed demon adds another brick of guilt to the pile building on her already breaking back. He confesses that he hates her, but that he loves her, too, because she's his mom. He can't help it.

She deserves the hate, but not the love. She sold her baby for ten years of a normal life. She's the reason that her children have had such a hard life, and she can never change that.

She finds her way back to controlling her body, and something clicks when she sees Ketch ready to kill Dean. She sees him with wide eyes, looking so much like the four-year-old he used to be behind his bloodied face.

His eyes have always been so expressive, and even now he can't hide the fear shining in them. The hopelessness from being out of options and injured.

And it clicks that Dean's _her_ boy. He's one of her babies, and it's her job to keep him alive. She's supposed to take care of him, not help in trying to kill him.

And, oh God, she locked him and Sam in the bunker with the power turned off, intending to leave them to suffocate to death.

She pushes that realization back along with the tears that burn behind her eyes with it.

Killing Ketch is the easiest choice she's made since her return, and it feels more right than her past decisions.

 _This_ is a good thing. _This_ is the right thing to do. She wishes she could take back her decision to work with them in the first place, but killing Ketch and saving Dean is a good start when it comes to making up for those mistakes.

Sam comes back safe, and they aren't okay, but they're all alive. They can fix the broken bonds between them later.

Her boys clutch onto her in a tight hug, and she clutches back just as desperately, unwilling to ever let go of them again.

* * *

They face Lucifer as a team, jumping in and out of a dimensional rift created by his Nephilim child. There's something ethereally beautiful about that tear in time and space and the way it glows in the night. She's never witnessed anything like it, and she never thought that such a thing could exist.

She thought she knew a lot about hunting from being raised by hunters, but her sons manage to keep showing her that the supernatural world is far vaster than she can imagine.

But the rift has to be closed, and they complete the spell, sacrificing Crowley in the process.

The problem is that she ends up on the wrong side of the rift, alone and trapped with an enraged Lucifer.

She doesn't know what comes next in that grey world. And maybe it's too little, too late, but she's glad that she's the one who's trapped and not one of her boys.

A mother is supposed to protect her children. If facing off against The Devil himself is what it takes to keep her boys safe, then that's what she's going to do. It's time for her to choose who she is and who she wants to be.

Besides, she's tired of running.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** As always, this is a tentatively complete story.


	5. Sam: High School

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

The butterfly knife weighs heavily at the bottom of his beat-up backpack. His dad gave it to him, but it will never be his.

He doesn't want it.

It's his first day at another new school, only this time Dean isn't attending with him. Dean dropped out, opting to get a GED instead and he's taken to spending his days hunting with their dad. A part of Sam resents him for it, but the anger that flairs when he's walking alone to school in the mornings and evenings is hard to hold onto when he remembers how alive Dean's become.

So, he grits his teeth and lives with it. He doesn't stand up for himself when the bullies peg him as an easy target since he's so small. He can take care of himself if he tries, but he doesn't see the point of solving his problems with his fists the way Dean does. Besides, if the bullies waste their time on him, maybe another kid gets to go home without fear that they'll be grabbed and roughed up.

But he's just arrived for the morning on his first day, and he knows that he'll have a bit of a grace period before anyone messes with him. Instead, he deals with the humiliation of standing in front of his classes every period and introducing himself.

He's Sam from nowhere. He was born in Kansas, for whatever that's worth. But he's only lived there for six months that he can't remember, so it's probably not worth much.

Then, he's told which seat to take (or, rarely, allowed to choose his own). It's always a seat in the middle of the room, and he wonders why it's been abandoned. He'll quietly sit there for the rest of the period, not listening much to the teacher because his last school covered the same topic already. So did the school before that one.

The teachers don't call on him. Maybe they don't want to make him more uncomfortable on his first day or they aren't sure how much was covered at his last school. Either way, he's glad for the reprieve that he gets on his first few days.

Rarely do his stays last past those first few days.

He makes it through lunch without issue, sitting alone and ignoring the stares and whispers of other kids. He wears clothes that don't fit him and aren't in style. They're torn and have stains that won't wash out of the faded fabric (blood that he can pass off as dirt most of the time).

They can stare and talk as much as they want. Sam won't be there long enough for it to matter.

* * *

As the final bell rings, it seems like he might get back to the motel without incident. Of course, being a Winchester (or, more specifically, being Sam Winchester) means that he isn't that lucky. A group of kids from one or another of his classes grab him right as he's leaving the school grounds. They're bigger than him and have a number advantage, not that either of those are difficult to accomplish.

They try to get money from him first, but it's obvious he doesn't have any. So, they move on to roughing him up and threatening to do worse if he tells anyone on them. He protects his head and laughs to himself at the knowledge that he doesn't have anyone to tell.

He walks away sore, but he's been much worse off after hunts and it's nothing he can't handle on his own.

He wipes away the trickle of blood from his split lip and thinks that he's lucky Dean won't be waiting at the motel for him. He doesn't have to explain what happened or why he refuses to stand up for himself when he's more than capable of it. He doesn't have to explain to Dean that he doesn't want to be seen as more of a freak than he already is, and it's hard enough to make friends without earning himself a reputation for fighting.

School might not be important to Dean, but it's one of the most important things to Sam. Sometimes, it feels like it's all he has. He's not a hunter, not by nature like his dad or Dean. He doesn't want to spend his life on the road, never knowing which hunt might be his last.

He wants more, but he buries those desires. Bringing them up would only lead to more arguments, and him and John are already at each other's throats more often than not.

He lets himself into the motel room and closes the door behind him, kicking off his shoes and dropping his bag to the floor. Maybe he'll do his homework. Maybe he won't.

He might be the perfect student in the eyes of his teachers, but he wonders what the point of it is if he's not allowed a normal life.

Sometimes, he thinks about college. Maybe, once he's a senior, he'll apply. Maybe he'll be accepted and go. Just… go and leave hunting behind.

He washes off the dirt and blood before he flops down on one of the two motel beds. The other kids in his class are probably having a homemade dinner around a table with their families. Or they might be hanging out. On a date and having dinner at whatever restaurant they can afford before heading out to see a movie.

* * *

As the evening draws to a close, Sam pulls himself from his bed and his thoughts to start his homework at the wobbly table in the kitchenette as he heats a can of soup on the stove. He glances at the pan every few seconds, knowing that the smell must be from food residue left on the stovetop from a previous tenant, but not wanting to ignore the possibility that the old thing might burst into flames at a moment's notice.

Once he starts eating, he realizes that maybe he didn't have to worry about a fire at all. His soup is still lukewarm at best, despite the burner's best efforts.

Dean would've taken him to a nearby diner for dinner, but Dean's not there and Sam isn't allowed to leave the motel room except to go to school or in the case of emergencies that would require him to seek help or safety. Lukewarm soup isn't an emergency, and he scoops one spoonful after another into his mouth. It's not good, but it's not bad. The important part is that his stomach is no longer growling when he finishes eating.

Being alone is easy. He doesn't have to pretend to be someone he's not. He doesn't have to fight to be the person he truly is at heart.

But being alone is difficult, too. It's easy to mistake loneliness for abandonment and tell himself that it's a lack of caring that keeps his family away, even when he knows that's not the truth.

* * *

John and Dean come back exhausted days later, but it's easy to see from Dean's grin and the spring in his steps that the hunt was a success. They both look ready to fall over, but John gives Sam a quick nod, asks what he wants to eat, and heads out to pick up some dinner for all of them.

"Hey, Sammy," Dean says, shucking out of his shoes and dirty jacket. "Have fun without us?"

"It was quiet," Sam says.

He tacks on a smile at the end like it's a joke, but it's the truth, too. It's an observation and not a real answer, but the real answer is that the quiet was suffocating and too much of a reminder that it could be permanent. It takes one second for a hunt to turn sour, and he knows that most hunters don't make it to old age.

"What? I'm not that loud," Dean says. He fakes being offended and sits on the bed across from Sam. "School go alright and all that?"

"It was fine. Same as always."

Dean looks at him like he's searching for something. Sam is fairly sure that he doesn't have any visible bruises or scrapes from his days at school (he claims he bit his lip when asked now that the split has mostly healed), but Dean always seems to be able to see where he's hurting even when there's no evidence.

"You sure?" Dean asks.

"Does it matter? We're leaving tomorrow anyway."

"Yeah, but you know you can talk to me, right?"

"I know," Sam says.

They have a few more irrelevant conversations while they wait for John to come back with some food. Simple things that aren't important and never will be. Dean describes the hunt, but it was routine and there's not much to say about it. Any comments Sam has about his days alone are vague and overly generalized.

There's a barrier between them. It hasn't always been there, and Sam's not sure when it started to appear, but it's there now and it's growing. Whether they want to acknowledge it or not, they aren't as close as they used to be. They've become different people with different wants.

Dean wants hunting. He wants monsters and women and bars and a family to come 'home' to.

Sam wants to stop pretending he's someone he's not.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** As always, this is a tentatively complete story.


	6. Dean: Demon Cured

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

Dean stands in the doorway of Sam's room, leaning against the frame. There's not enough light to see much beyond the vague outline of a grown man beneath the blankets of a bed, but Dean can't stop himself from continuing to stare like he'll find something more. Or something less.

Sam almost died that morning. Worse, he almost died by Dean's hands. And Dean wanted to kill him.

If he hadn't ducked when Dean swung the hammer…

If Cas hadn't shown up and intervened…

He runs a hand down his face, taking a shaky breath at the mere thought that he was almost the end of his own brother. He's beyond exhausted, but every time he lies down and closes his eyes, he only sees Sam's terrified face, and that fear is directed at him. He only feels the weight of a hammer in one hand, and the slight disappointment when it strikes the wall instead of flesh and bone.

And it makes him sick.

How the hell is he supposed to start making up for that? How the hell is he supposed to make up for everything he's done over the past months?

He wants nothing more than to drown himself in liquor until he forgets his own name. Sure, he drank plenty as a demon, but it didn't taste the same. It didn't taste like much at all, but he always wanted more. He was driven by his instincts. He was driven by sin.

He walks through the halls of the bunker with a reverence that he's rarely shown for anything in his life. He wanted Sam to make this a home in his absence. When he said he was proud of them—when he was so sure that he wasn't going to see another day—he hoped that it would be enough for Sam to move on.

He shouldn't be surprised that moving on was the last thing Sam did. After all, he's no stranger to the desperation that comes with losing his family.

And that's enough to remind him that he didn't give a shit when Cole had Sam. When Cole was threatening Sam to get to him because of some hunt he did a fucking decade, or more, ago. Some hunt that he doesn't even remember anymore. Well, maybe he'd threatened Cole in return, but he didn't have any plans to go out of his way to help Sam.

He didn't lift a finger to _try_ helping Sam. He simply promised to kill his killer… if they crossed paths. If it happened to be convenient for him.

And it's one more thing to add to his list of things that he'll never be able to make up to Sam.

For all his spewing about family first and saving people and watching out for Sammy, he really dropped the ball over these past few months.

The weight of the guilt from his actions nearly knocks him to his knees. There's the burn of tears behind his eyes, and he wishes he could feel a burn in his throat from alcohol instead. He just wants to be numb at this point. He wants to drink until he forgets his own name, because it'll be easier than facing what he's done.

Demons are creatures of sin, and he feels like one hell of a sinner.

Cas finds him like that, leaning against the wall as though his legs can't support his weight. Dean doesn't even notice he's decided to return until his hand is on his shoulder and he's asking Dean if he's alright.

Dean lets out a strangled laugh. Is _he_ okay? How can he ever be okay again? How is he supposed to face Sam again?

"It wasn't you," Cas says. Like he read Dean's mind, and maybe that's exactly what he did.

"It was," Dean says. "It was me. Every second of it was me."

"It wasn't _you_ ," Cas says again, stressing the last word.

He remembers a time when he tried convincing Sam of the same thing, that the actions of soulless Sam were not _his_ actions. For the first time, he really understands Sam's argument.

The Zippo is in _his_ pocket.

Sam, at that time, didn't even remember what his soulless body had done throughout that year, or the six months that came after he revealed his presence to Dean.

Dean, on the other hand, remembers it all. And, God, he wishes he didn't.

"I was aware of what was going on. I made my own choices," Dean says. "It was me in every way that mattered."

* * *

Dean already has breakfast ready by the time Sam stumbles into the kitchen the next morning. By the look of him, Dean assumes that last night was no more restful for Sam than it was for him.

Sam's visibly on edge and keeps his distance. Dean plasters on a smile and pretends that it doesn't hurt to have his little brother be afraid of him. But Sam has every right to be on edge around someone who tried to kill him just a day ago.

Sam takes an offered plate filled with food with a tight-lipped smile, and Dean considers it a small victory, but an important one.

Dean's not hungry, but he makes a plate for himself and takes the seat across from Sam at the table. Sam struggles to use his left hand to eat while his right arm is trapped in a sling, and Dean wonders if he aggravated that injury when he was a demon.

"How's the, uh…" Dean asks, gesturing at Sam's injured arm and knowing—hoping—that Sam still understands what he's trying to say without him actually saying it.

"It's getting better," Sam says.

But Dean sees the pain on Sam's face when he tries to shift that arm and knows that, if anything, it's gotten worse instead of better.

"Did I, you know, make it worse yesterday?" Dean asks.

He's not a doctor, and he knows that there isn't shit that he can do to fix Sam's arm if he _did_ make it worse in any significant way, but he still has to know. He can get Sam medical attention, if that's what he needs.

Sam shakes his head too quickly and too many times. He doesn't look at Dean, choosing instead to stare at the breakfast he hasn't seemed all that interested in eating so far.

"No. No, you didn't," he says.

He's lying, but Dean lets him. He knows enough to decide against trying to talk Sam into admitting that he's hurting more than he lets on, and he knows enough to avoid the argument they'd spiral into if he chooses to pursue the topic.

So, he nods like he believes Sam.

He has to walk on eggshells, because he's been gone for months and he left Sam behind without a second thought. They both have some relearning to do, and he wonders if Sam feels like as much of an outsider in the bunker as he does. He doesn't even know how to act around his own brother anymore, and that bothers him more than he wants to admit.

He pretends to like his own cooking and shovels his breakfast into his mouth, barely tasting it. He wishes Sam would follow his lead, because he looks like he needs some nourishment. The past months have been noticeably harder on him, physically, than they have been on Dean.

Emotionally? Mentally? The jury is still out on those, but Dean knows they both took hard hits. It's just easier to hide the wounds. Cas can reassure him as many times as he wants that what he did as a demon wasn't _his_ fault, but Dean will never believe that. He made choices, and he has to live with those choices now.

But Dean keeps his thoughts to himself and doesn't dare to try forcing Sam to eat. He considers himself lucky that Sam can stand being in the same room as him at all, and he can act like Sam's lack of appetite doesn't bother him in exchange for that.

* * *

The day passes in tense silence, neither one of them willing to try breaking it. They glance at each other like children and look away quickly if caught staring. Dean's ready to tear his hair out strand by strand and demand that Sam tells him what he needs to do to make their relationship right again. Make a goddamn list if he wants, Dean will check off every single task on it.

Dean pours himself a drink, hoping that alcohol will wash away the disappointment in knowing that he's made little progress in fixing anything that day and Sam is still skittish—at best—around him. It gets harder to pretend it doesn't hurt that Sam doesn't trust him like he used to, even if Dean has given him every reason _not_ to trust him.

He turns around, and Sam is there behind him. Sam freezes in place, stopping his approach, and Dean internally begs him to continue with whatever he had planned while he keeps a mask of neutrality on his face.

Hit him.

Yell at him.

Take the whiskey bottle and smash it over his goddamn head.

Hug him and start the biggest chick-flick moment they've ever had.

But whatever Sam wants, it doesn't look like he's going to say or do anything.

So, Dean pushes the sting of that deep within himself and speaks instead. "Maybe we should take a break from hunting," he says. "Takes a vacation."

Sam's eyes fall on the Mark of Cain, ugly on his arm.

"The Mark can wait," Dean says. "Besides, we're not gonna be able to do anything like _this_. We need a break, man."

"I don't know," Sam says.

"At the very least, we should take it easy until you can ditch the sling."

Sam is quiet for long enough that Dean thinks he's going to keep protesting, but he nods instead. It's barely a jerk of his head, but it's another small victory in Dean's book.

A smile breaks out on Dean's face, and it's the first time since he was cured that he doesn't have to hide how he feels.

"You want me to grab you some painkillers for that arm?" he asks. "I know it's bothering you."

Sam nods again. "I didn't want to take any before because… Just in case."

Because he was afraid that Dean's been pretending.

Because he wanted to be at the top of his game.

Just in case the cure didn't work.

Dean can fill in the blanks with any number of reasons, but Sam's given him a task and he sets his drink on the counter.

He knows the way to their medicine cabinet, has walked that path more times than he can count, but it feels like it's been a lifetime since he last walked it.

That last time, Sam probably trusted him more than he does now.

He wants that back. He doesn't want Sam to feel like he has to hide from him. He doesn't want Sam to feel like he has to keep his guard up around him.

He wants them to be brothers again.

* * *

 **Author's Note:** As always, this is a tentatively complete story.


	7. Castiel

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Supernatural.

* * *

"Was it all worth it, brother?"

Cas stands in front of one of the many, many identical doors leading to another subsection of Heaven. This one, however, holds a special importance. Beyond it, two souls rest instead of one.

Sam and Dean Winchester.

They didn't make it to retirement age, but no one expected them to, especially not themselves. The hunting lifestyle doesn't allow for it, unless they were to follow Bobby's path and become a hub of safety and information for other hunters. But the need to fight the supernatural with their own hands and save innocents was in their blood, and they hunted until it killed them.

 _Sam holds his hand out, presumably to shake Cas', flustered and blurting out how much of an honor it is to meet an angel. Cas doesn't bother himself with mortal formalities and ignores the hand until Sam slowly lowers it._

 _Cas calls him the boy with the demon blood, and he looks horrified. He looks ashamed of it, and he should be ashamed. To have demon blood running through his veins is to be tainted by evil. By darkness._

 _And it is Cas' mission to push him closer to that darkness._

Sam proved him wrong. Cas thought that he was doing the right thing by following orders and playing his proper role to start the Apocalypse and usher in paradise on Earth. But Sam and Dean weren't having it. They fought tooth and nail against the destiny given to them to the point that they rewrote their own future.

Cas likes to think that he helped. Yes, he let Sam out of the panic room in order to finish breaking the seals on Lucifer's cage, but he also distracted Michael with holy oil using a trick that Dean came up with when they reached the showdown between Michael and Lucifer to give Dean time to try and get through to Sam.

When he opens the door and peers into their Heaven, he sees the scars on their souls from their respective times in Hell. Yet, they still smile and laugh in their memories, unfazed by the horrors they faced in their lives, and in their many deaths.

They're resilient.

 _Dean is screaming. He knows it's Dean because he senses Alastair's presence close to Dean's tortured soul. It's taking him too long to reach Dean's soul, but he and the rest of his brothers have been fighting with all of their might to reach him before he succumbs and breaks the first seal._

 _With how heavily reinforced the section of Hell he's kept in is, Cas knows that they won't make it in time. He also knows that, had he been given his orders earlier, they would have been able to prevent the seal from breaking. Still, he will raise the soul of Dean Winchester from perdition because it's the mission he's been given._

He closes the door to Sam and Dean's Heaven, age old shame filling him. He learned shortly after raising Dean that the plan was to start the Apocalypse, and that Dean was raised to fulfill a different destiny.

He was raised only after he broke and became the torturer because the seal needed to break.

And Cas accepted that. He understood the importance of bringing paradise to Earth through the Apocalypse. He played his role, until he was convinced that they should be preventing Lucifer's return, not accelerating it.

Dean taught him that sometimes orders must be disobeyed.

 _Seeing Dean on the ground after Sam jumps into The Cage with Lucifer is the first time he feels true regret for his actions. Maybe he'd felt sorry that things had to play out this way before, but seeing Dean crushed by losing Sam to a fate worse than death makes him realize that the way he felt before was nothing compared to the guilt that swallows him now._

 _Cas knows that he shouldn't be alive as surely as he knows that it was_ God _who brought him back. He doesn't know why, but he knows that it could have been no one else._

 _He heals Dean's face, but that doesn't take away the horror and pain from his eyes._

 _Later, in the Impala, he rides in the passenger seat. Dean is angry enough that he appears unnaturally calm._

" _He brought you back, but what about Sam? What about me? Huh? Where's my grand prize?" he asks. "All I got is my brother in a hole."_

Cas made his decision to pull Sam from The Cage after that, and found out later that he failed to bring back what made Sam into _Sam_ : his soul.

But he tried because he learned what it meant to have free will from Sam and Dean. He made the choice to try and free Sam from eternal torment. He might not have succeeded, but he helped. Sam's body returning gave Dean real hope that Sam's soul could be returned, too.

And they beat the odds again.

 _Cas feels his control slipping away. The power of the souls from Purgatory is stronger than he anticipated, and his vessel is breaking apart at the seams._

 _He hears Sam praying to him. Offering him help._

 _After everything he's done to them, the Winchesters are still there to save him if he wants saving. They'll help him get rid of the souls from Purgatory, even though he revealed just how broken Sam's soul has become after his time in The Cage with Lucifer by breaking the wall in his mind._

 _They'll help him even after he tried to be their god. After he demanded that they kneel before him._

 _It isn't the first time that his pride has gotten them into a nasty situation, and he accepts that he made foolish choices._

 _He accepts their help._

They taught him what it meant to have a friend. To have someone he can always count on. They taught him about loyalty, and they taught him that they're stronger together.

 _Cas starts extracting Gadreel's grace from Sam, but he can't bring himself to finish the task. Sam might want him to, but Cas knows that he won't survive if the grace is completely removed. Instead, he uses the remnants to heal Sam's lingering wounds._

 _Dean is… somewhere else, but Cas thinks that he should be at the bunker. He never understands the rifts that open between the brothers. For two souls destined to spend eternity in a shared Heaven, they separate a lot. They argue a lot._

 _But he keeps moving forward and knows that it won't be long before Sam and Dean are on the same page once again._

 _Meanwhile, he's become a thief, but Sam and Dean need him to survive. So, he steals grace just to keep moving forward. It's an equation that balances itself._

 _If he is to live, a different angel must die._

 _He feels like a monster surviving this way, but they all make hard choices and justify the means with the end._

 _Was this how Sam felt when he was tricked into his demon blood addiction? This consistent feeling of not quite being any one creature, but a monstrous hybrid that shouldn't exist._

Sam and Dean taught him what it means to be human. Like many angels, he had been obedient to a fault, but with that small bit of wonder about what it was that made humans so special to God that the angels were to love them _more_ than Him.

They can adapt to impossible situations and find hope no matter how bleak the future seems. They're imperfect, but they embrace that imperfection and find strength in it. It's angels who are the more imperfect ones. Arrogant to a fault. Blind to truths they don't want to acknowledge. Too set in their ways.

 _Lucifer has him pressed against The Cage, or the mockery of it that Rowena is using to hold Lucifer temporarily. He promises that he can defeat Amara. That they_ need _him if they want to defeat Amara._

 _And Cas knows the power that Lucifer holds. He's been on the receiving end of that power in Stull Cemetery, when Lucifer killed him with a snap of his fingers._

" _Can you really beat her?" Cas asks._

" _I can."_

 _Cas signs away his freedom for the world, allowing Lucifer to take over his vessel. If this is the cost of saving the world from Amara's wrath, then he'll gladly pay it._

Sam and Dean taught him what it means to make sacrifices. They taught him that sometimes he has to give up something for the greater good.

They gave up the chance to have normal lives and stayed hunters for the sake of saving people until the day they died. Bled out together in the middle of nowhere, their bodies left for Cas to give a proper hunter's funeral. No one else would've been able to find them.

And he only gave them that hunter's funeral after he peeked into their Heaven and saw how happy they were. How they'd found a peace they could have never achieved in life. Until he saw that, he'd been prepared to find a way to bring them back.

But it's better for them to stay in Heaven this time. He knows that, and it would be selfish of him to drag them back to a world that's been nothing but cruel to them.

He turns away from the door, beyond which two souls rest that have taught him more than his millennia as Heaven's faithful soldier ever could, to face his curious brother.

"Yes," he says. "It was worth it."

* * *

 **Author's Note:** As always, this is a tentatively complete story.


End file.
